Explosive Thunder Paseong
Dragged along by the four of them, Jeong-Hoon only managed to plant his own feet on the ground once they reached the stairs at the entrance.
“Whew, you don’t need to surround me like that. I’m not planning on bolting, so ease up.”
Jeong-Hoon grumbled at the four people standing around him as if to box him in, then rolled out his stiff body. Even with the suit boosting his physical abilities, Si-Eun—now SS-class—had poured genuine acceleration into the run, and his body was far from normal.
“I know I’d only get in the way if I went over there.”
He pointed toward the building whose ceiling had been blown clean off by Butler Ju’s Paseong, and everyone nodded. A full-power clash between two SSS-class fighters and a powerhouse beyond even that was a transcendent realm no SS-class could hope to approach.
“Gaju, then shall we begin preparations…?”
“Hold on, Head Maid. Before we head out, there’s something I’d like to experiment with. Could you lend me a hand?”
At Jeong-Hoon’s sudden counter, Si-Eun edged closer. She had given up on approaching the battle, but she figured he was simply making excuses because he wanted to stay behind with the two of them.
“No, please at least hear me out to the end before you try to stop me, Hunter Han Si-Eun!”
Sensing her approach, Jeong-Hoon shouted, and Si-Eun instead fixed him with narrowed eyes.
“Chairman, is this experiment of yours important?”
“It feels like it could be extremely important.”
As he spoke, Jeong-Hoon stamped his foot on the stairs and nodded, clearly registering that the discomfort had lessened compared to earlier.
“So, Head Maid. Could you try blowing a little of that mana into me?”
“……What?!”
Unable to guess what experiment he intended, Jeong I-Yeong showed uncharacteristic fluster at Jeong-Hoon’s abrupt request to have mana forced into him.
Once the Heavenly Being began unleashing its power in earnest, Butler Ju and Jeong Si-Min found themselves hard-pressed merely to defend. The Heavenly Being’s halo spun, flinging razor-sharp winds while powerful water jets sprayed forth. Their own attacks simply turned to mist and slipped away.
“This thing seems to be getting stronger, doesn’t it?”
“It is actually growing stronger. It’s continuously absorbing the surrounding mana.”
As Jeong Si-Min grumbled while supporting Butler Ju—who had fallen while blocking a water stream the Heavenly Being had fired—Butler Ju shook his head and answered. As the strongest of the 12 Vassals, Jeong Si-Min could not use magic or martial arts, so he was duller at reading the flow of mana than Butler Ju; only after hearing the explanation did he grasp the truth.
“Then isn’t this dangerous? This Castle of the Sky is floating on mana, after all.”
Calling the aerial garden by its original name, the Castle of the Sky, Si-Min complained, and Butler Ju shook his head.
“That will not happen. Any mana it cannot absorb is being redirected back into the facility’s control systems.”
Perhaps because it was an artifact originally created to govern this place, even while devouring mana it remained faithful to its duty. Thus Butler Ju explained the point while dodging the Heavenly Being’s assaults.
This time, instead of a water jet, it shaped the water into a giant convex lens, and the jewels set in the halo fired beams.
Ziiing!
The beams gathered in the lens and swept across the spot where Butler Ju and Jeong Si-Min had stood.
“This is insane. Not only that creature, but the castle itself is recovering?”
As the wall the beam had scoured shone with golden light and restored itself, Si-Min shook his head.
“I see. I think I understand why that thing maintains the castle.”
But seeing it, Butler Ju followed Si-Min in calling the place a castle, thought of one possibility, and clicked his tongue. At this rate, sending Jeong-Hoon to escape first had been a mistake. Obsessed with securing the Gaju’s safety—the most vital duty of a vassal—he had lost the surest means of conquering the creature.
“Explain in more detail.”
“What sustains that is not mighty mana, but the power of the seal. More precisely, it has been modified so that it can wield mighty mana by means of the seal’s power.”
It was hard even to imagine how desperately the inhuman beings trapped in the severed space of a shattered, sealed dimension had striven to retaliate against the power that imprisoned them. They had devised a way to exploit that power before their lifespans ended and had planned their revenge.
“So in truth this Castle of the Sky did not have its seal released; rather, it broke through space while keeping the seal intact, and therefore it must maintain the castle in order to draw on the seal’s power and act?”
Dodging the beam, Jeong Si-Min asked back, and Butler Ju nodded as he twisted his body clear. But wind came flying in the very direction he had turned.
“……!”
Caught in the prejudice that the opponent could not stack its abilities any further, Butler Ju’s eyes flew wide. He himself had already been using abilities in overlapping fashion, and so the prejudice had taken root. He had forgotten that the opponent was no half-baked existence, but something of SSS-class or higher.
“Joo Yeong-Cheol!”
Si-Min, still dodging attacks, saw Butler Ju and unconsciously cried out his name. It was not a cry of respect for the family’s head butler, but a cry of worry for a cherished junior and younger brother.
Kwaddeuk!
“……If I fell to an attack of this level, I would have to step down from the position of head butler. There is no need to worry, Si-Min hyung-nim.”
Deliberately using the form of address he had used for him in his youth, Butler Ju raised his fist and blocked the Heavenly Being’s wind. The sharp gale tried to pierce his fist, yet was stopped by the mana he had drawn up.
“To shake this off, it seems there is no choice. Paseong, Nopo.”
Opening the true power of Paseong’s evolved form, Butler Ju twisted his body and thrust his fist forward. Even the mana contained in the wind was entirely absorbed by him; not only mana but everything around him gathered toward him and condensed into a single point.
Shuuung!
Befitting a martial art named after the siege weapon ballista, a massive arrow-like flash of light streaked toward the Heavenly Being.
“!!!”
Even for a Heavenly Being that surpassed SSS-class, its expression twisted at the threatening force, and it wrapped its wings to raise a defensive barrier.
Kugwagwang!!!
The barrier shattered futilely, and the extended arrow of aura smashed the Heavenly Being’s wing.
Peong!
As the wing broke and the rebounding aura arrow lodged in the building, the entire structure exploded and vanished.
“……The mana was supposed to be sealed, yet humans of this era wield such power?”
At a force rarely seen even in the mythic age before the seal, the Heavenly Being muttered in apparent surprise as it looked back at its broken wing. Having sacrificed one wing to barely deflect the aura arrow, it frowned at the fact that the wing did not regenerate at once. As long as the domain was maintained it would eventually recover using the seal’s power, but the delay was certainly inconvenient. This form was what the sealed Heavenly Beings had created while burning with desire for revenge. Alongside the symbolism of vengeance, wings were essential to exert maximum combat power.
Chijik! Chijik!
“Ah, ah, Butler Ju? Professor Jeong? Can you hear me? Head Maid says the mana interference seems to have disappeared…….”
As the Heavenly Being’s attacks halted while it recovered its wing and the battle paused, Jeong-Hoon’s radio reached Butler Ju and Jeong Si-Min.
“We hear you, Gaju. Have you not escaped yet?”
Since eliminating the power of the seal was the most efficient strategy, Butler Ju felt relief that Jeong-Hoon had not yet escaped, yet also worry. He had used Nopo because the situation was dangerous, but he had done so believing Jeong-Hoon would already have fled and thus be safe. If he had not yet escaped, a martial art of such destructive power must not be used.
“Yes, I can hear you well. From now on I’m going to reclaim the seal of this aerial garden. So smash the entire aerial garden to pieces. If my guess is right, once this disappears that fake angel will disappear too.”
At Jeong-Hoon’s radio saying exactly the same conclusion Butler Ju had reached while fighting the Heavenly Being, Butler Ju unconsciously nodded.
“Understood, Gaju. But how will you reclaim the power of the seal?”
He knew Jeong-Hoon was maintaining the seal, yet with Anubis it had been pure coincidence. If the seal were reclaimed simply by Jeong-Hoon making contact, it should have collapsed the moment he set foot on the aerial garden. Thus Butler Ju asked with doubt, wondering if Jeong-Hoon had perhaps awakened a method of handling the seal’s power.
“Uh, I’ve prepared a method.”
But the reply that came back was Jeong-Hoon’s somewhat vague, and yet very tired-sounding words.
As the mana of Han Si-Eun, Jeong I-Yeong, Yeo Tae-Hyeon, and Dong Sa-Seong swept through Jeong-Hoon’s body, golden mana erupted from him.
“……This really doesn’t get any easier. This is mana?”
Pointing not at the golden radiance coming from his own body but at the mana the four had sent, he asked, and everyone nodded. They had already gone through several experiments, yet Jeong-Hoon still could not grow accustomed to the discomfort mana brought. Every time it swept through him he was on the verge of dry heaving. Had there been no results from the first attempt, he would have cleanly abandoned the experiment.
“Chairman, once we wrap up this incident, how about getting an awakening test first?”
“Me? I’m a Non-Awakened.”
“……Looking at this, who would think the Chairman is a Non-Awakened?”
Pointing at the stairs and surroundings that had returned to the ruins inside the dungeon—with no trace left of the prime that had been restored when the dungeon collapsed—Si-Eun spoke, and Jeong-Hoon shrugged.
“So in Hunter Han Si-Eun’s eyes, am I an Awakened?”
“……No.”
Looking at Jeong-Hoon who was clearly emitting golden mana yet strangely possessed none of the unique feel of an Awakened, Si-Eun shook her head vigorously. Jeong-Hoon chuckled as he removed his helmet and the suit’s gloves, then placed both hands on the ground.
“I’m ready. Let’s begin.”
Thinking he could not joke around and waste time while Butler Ju and Jeong Si-Min waited, Jeong-Hoon finished preparations, and the four immediately drew up as much of their mana as possible and sent it into him.
“Uurp!”
As mana entered and nausea rose, Jeong-Hoon still dry-heaved while enduring it.
Woooong!
The more mana flowed into Jeong-Hoon, the stronger the golden mana erupting from his body became. Everywhere the light of that golden mana touched returned to the original ruins.
“Chairman, you have to hold on!”
“Ah, I know! Uweeeek!!!”
As Jeong-Hoon seemed about to tire from the mana’s repulsion, Si-Eun—who was pouring mana into him—encouraged him. But Jeong-Hoon opened his mouth to answer and instead vomited stomach acid. His arms trembled violently from the influx. The discomfort surged until he wanted to shout for them to stop that very instant. Even a severe hangover from drinking himself senseless would have been less painful. Yet Jeong-Hoon endured. Focusing on the sealing mana erupting from his body, he suppressed the discomfort as much as possible. And as he concentrated on that sealing mana, something appeared within him.
“Huh? The seal hasn’t even been released, so how are you here……?”
More precisely, looking upon the core of the seal connected to the power Jeong-Hoon originally should have possessed, something was surprised as it regarded him.
“Ah, so that’s it? You’re having a hard time too. Well, hang in there.”
As the voice that cheered with an awkward laugh faded, Jeong-Hoon felt the core of the seal emit a powerful light. And in that moment, the power of the seal that erupted from his body swept over the entire aerial garden.
Sensing that something was happening, the Heavenly Being tried to shake off Butler Ju and Jeong Si-Min and run, but the two blocked its path. Though its wings were recovering, it had grown noticeably weaker. No power surpassing SSS-class could be felt; only mana at the lowest level even among SSS-class remained.
“M-Move! Descendants of the traitor! I, I have a mission!!!”
“We too have our mission.”
The halo spun and emitted mana, yet its rotation was painfully slow. The mana it released was pathetic. From SSS-class it dropped to SS-class, then further to S-class. Eventually the Heavenly Being’s power sank to A-class level.
“Uwaaah!!!”
And as the power of the seal Jeong-Hoon had emitted enveloped the entire aerial garden, the body of the Heavenly Being that had somehow tried to break through froze solid.
“Si-Min hyung-nim, please take care of those jewels!”
As the Heavenly Being froze, Butler Ju gathered mana and shouted; Jeong Si-Min used Blink to extract the Heavenly Being’s halo. As he pulled the halo free, the ring of mana shattered, and three jewels that had lost their radiance came into his hand.
“Joo Yeong-Cheol!”
“Gaju, we are ready here!”
“We’ve escaped too!”
Jeong Si-Min, having recovered the jewels, wrapped himself in a gray dimensional gate and vanished. Hearing even the radio of Jeong-Hoon—who had jumped down to escape—Butler Ju did not hesitate and unleashed his mana.
Kwajijik!!!
As Butler Ju changed his stance and moved his legs, the ground was scraped and gouged by powerful mana. The mana that dug the earth stretched outward and drew a giant magic circle.
Pajik, pajijik!
The magic circle resonated with Butler Ju’s mana, and a fierce current of power coursed through his body.
Hwareureuk!
As the flowing mana current blazed, Butler Ju raised his fist.
Kwarurung!!!
Butler Ju’s mana soared into the sky, and a powerful thunderbolt crashed down onto his fist. Grasping that thunderbolt, he slammed it with all his strength onto the floor where he stood!
Pokroipasung
The final form of Paseong — Explosive Thunder Paseong
True to its name, the thunderbolt that fell from the sky exploded and destroyed the Castle of the Sky.
Kwaaang! Peong! Kugugung!!!
The tremendous power of Pokroipasung spread throughout the entire castle; cracks raced across the whole aerial garden, and then a massive explosion of mana erased the aerial garden without a trace.